


the ripening of the peach

by andnowforyaya



Series: yaya's winter writing blast 2015 [1]
Category: B.A.P, K-pop
Genre: Alternate Universe - Royalty, M/M, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-05-01 21:16:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5221112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andnowforyaya/pseuds/andnowforyaya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the third time that afternoon, Yongguk reached across the small table and pressed his longest finger against Daehyun’s forehead, keeping the young prince’s head from drooping and banging onto the hard surface covered in books and scrolls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the ripening of the peach

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Embers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Embers/gifts).



> for embers, who said: "Bangdae. I just want fluff ;A; Maybe in that verse where Dae is a cute spoiled prince? Thank you <33333"
> 
> hope you like it~

For the third time that afternoon, Yongguk reached across the small table and pressed his longest finger against Daehyun’s forehead, keeping the young prince’s head from drooping and banging onto the hard surface covered in books and scrolls. They were seated cross-legged on cushions at the low table in one of Daehyun’s rooms.

“If you’re so tired,” Yongguk said, “why don’t you just take a break, Your Highness? Nothing’s going into your head this way.” He smirked, dropping his hand from Daehyun’s cool, dry skin, as Daehyun shook the sleep from fogging his brain.

“I can’t, Yongguk,” Daehyun said with a frown. He blinked sluggishly. Clearly the long passages detailing the history of the state were not gripping reading material. He sighed down at the book before him. “Seung Ho will test me today. If I don’t pass, Junhong will…”

Daehyun trailed off, his narrow shoulders sloping further under a comfortable tunic. Seung Ho was his tutor in all things regarding the court. Daehyun was fifteen this year, just starting to come into his body, and expected to be able to keep up with civil affairs. Every time Yongguk looked at Daehyun, though, he just remembered the little boy tripping after him in the gardens, eager to play and share stories. They’d grown up together, Yongguk three years older, with the understanding that he would be groomed to be a member of Daehyun’s council. Yongguk took the responsibility to heart -- perhaps too far. He knew he had a fondness for the young Prince that might interfere with his ability to give him sound and unbiased council.

But he would worry about that later.

He frowned also at the mention of Junhong, mirroring Daehyun’s expression. Junhong was a servant, perhaps best known as Daehyun’s whipping boy, chosen by his father the King, and Yongguk’s heart still clenched at the memory of Daehyun at twelve years, sobbing into Yongguk’s lap, after he watched Junhong receive two lashes for Daehyun accidentally breaking one of his mother’s favorite vases in the garden. It didn’t matter that the lashes did not cut deep and Junhong had recovered within the day; the shock of it, the knowledge that his actions would cause an innocent person’s suffering, had kept Daehyun up at night for the weeks following.

Now, he and Junhong had become friends, and Yongguk admitted he had a soft spot for the serving boy as well, sweet and guileless and loyal, and Daehyun tried his very hardest not to make any mistakes. Ever.

“You’re tired,” Yongguk finally said. “You’re not doing yourself _or_ Junhong any favors trying to study with a wandering mind. Let’s reinvigorate ourselves with a walk in the gardens, perhaps. The day is lovely.”

It was. Yongguk saw Daehyun glance past his shoulder out of his windows, where the curtains had been drawn back to let in the golden sunlight of autumn. When he refocused, Daehyun said, “No. Read to me,” a petulant pout in his lips.

“Read to you?”

Daehyun crossed his arms in from his chest, his sleeves trailing. “You used to. When we were little. I...think I could pay attention if you read the text out loud. I don’t have time for a walk, anyway. My tutor will be here in about an hour.”

“And you’ve just now started to prepare?”

Daehyun bristled, but he also blushed, his arms hugging himself tighter. “I tried to study; I’ve been -- distracted.”

It was true. Over the past few days, as the weather turned from the stuffy and dense humidity of summer to the coolness of autumn, Daehyun had been sparse around the palace grounds, and Yongguk would often stumble across Daehyun and Junhong hidden away in some alcove or behind a bookshelf, talking in low voices, startling when Yongguk found them. He didn’t think anything of the situation, then, but now he wonders if he’d actually interrupted something special blooming between the two young boys.

As a prince, Daehyun of course would be granted his youthful dalliances before the topic of marriage arose, though the idea of both caused Yongguk’s heart to twist unnaturally.

Daehyun looked nakedly hopeful, his eyes bright and large, his mouth a perfect ‘o’ of expectation. Yongguk wondered how his lips could always be such a wonderful cerise. His heart untwisted. “Very well,” Yongguk said, pulling the book Daehyun was trying to read toward him. “Where shall I start?”

“Wait,” Daehyun demanded, and Yongguk paused. “I want to lie down.”

“You’ll just fall asleep,” Yongguk said. “I know you.”

“It’ll be more comfortable,” Daehyun said, his voice taking on the nasally tone of complaining. “We’ve been sitting for hours!”

“Very well,” Yongguk said again, and Daehyun scrambled up from the table to start to rearrange them both. He pulled the table away from Yongguk’s knees, and when Yongguk glanced at him quizzically, said nothing but began to crawl toward him. A prince on his knees. Absurd! Yongguk was just about to make a remark when Daehyun dropped his head into Yongguk’s lap and curled up on the cushion he had brought with him.

“There,” Daehyun said. “That’s better.”

“Your Highness…” Yongguk didn’t know what to say. They were well past the age where this kind of behavior would be seen as acceptable. As kids, Daehyun crawled all over him, playing with his hair, giving him breath-stopping hugs, but he’d had to cool off as they both got older.

“‘When the new dynasty was promulgated and officially brought into existence…’” Daehyun recited. “That’s where I am.”

Yongguk began reading from there, his voice low and steady and flowing over words like water over stones.

Not much time passed before Yongguk started feeling the pull of sleep himself, and when he looked down, he found Daehyun breathing evenly, his eyes closed, his lips slightly parted. In the gold-tinted light of an autumn afternoon, their prince seemed to be glowing. That fondness crept up over him again. Daehyun was peacefully asleep in his lap, his hair soft and inviting. Yongguk put the book to the side and ran his fingers through the strands of Daehyun’s hair, holding his breath, afraid to break this peace.

He must have stared for a long time. He was focused on the tiny freckle under one of Daehyun’s eyes when a servant announced quietly that Daehyun’s tutor was here, and would he like to receive him? Yongguk considered, and almost turned him away, but Junhong sprang into his mind then, and the punishment he would receive for Daehyun skipping a test in order to nap. He waved him in.

Rousing Daehyun almost broke Yongguk’s heart. He looked so wonderfully idyllic that Yongguk wished this moment could be frozen in time forever. Maybe Daehyun didn’t have to mature and take a partner and sit on the throne. They could stay like this, studying for and taking tests, getting lost in the gardens, picking sweet fruit from the peach trees in the summer and biting into that succulent meat, juices dribbling down their chins.

“Daehyunnie,” he cooed, shaking Daehyun’s shoulder. “Your Highness, Seung Ho is coming, now.”

Daehyun’s brows furrowed. He turned his face further into Yongguk’s lap, and Yongguk felt his face flush hot and red. He had to wake him before the tutor came in and saw Daehyun like this. “Wake up,” Yongguk tried again, a little louder. “Your Highness.”

His lashes quivered against his cheeks, and Daehyun opened his eyes. He had a spot of dried drool in the corner of his mouth that Yongguk wanted very much to wipe away with his thumb. Instead, he said gently, “The tutor is coming.”

“I fell asleep,” Daehyun said a little miserably, his face dark.

“It’s all right,” Yongguk reassured him, “you’ll do well on the test. You’re smart. I’m sure you were absorbing all that information even as you were sleeping, hm?”

“Ugh,” Daehyun said, wiping at his face with both hands. He lifted himself from Yongguk’s lap, his hair flat on the side he’d fallen asleep on. He ran both hands through his hair, too, and said, “I’m sorry.”

Yongguk wanted to kiss his forehead, but the tutor was announced again then, and came into the room.

.

Yongguk was reviewing the tax laws and procedures the council would be discussing in the meeting tomorrow (Yongguk would be more of a fly on the wall than an actual contributor to discussion, but he still wanted to know what everyone was talking about) when Daehyun came into his study, his smile bright and his gait bouncy like a skip. He skipped right on over to one of Yongguk’s lounge sofas, spreading himself across the cushions.

“I take that it went well?” Yongguk asked, a grin spreading over his lips.

“I knew the answer to every question,” Daehyun crowed. “We debated the values of the court and, let me tell you, I don’t think Seung Ho has ever looked so surprised!”

“You’re always arguing with me,” Yongguk muttered.

“I just pretended he was you,” Daehyun admitted. “It made everything so much easier.”

“I’m not sure if I should take offense.” Yongguk tried to sound stern about it, but that grin wouldn’t leave his lips no matter how hard he tried. Something about Daehyun just made him want to smile.

“You should not,” Daehyun told him. “Yongguk, you know I like you very much.”

His heart jumped at the words. The tax laws swam before him. “Do I know this?” he attempted to tease, but it sounded more hopeful than playful, even to himself.

Daehyun was a prince and Yongguk was going to be his advisor. He remembered how Daehyun’s hair had felt under his fingers, soft and wonderful. Daehyun always smelled like rose from the baths, and peaches from gorging on the fruit. He felt uncertain for the first time in his life about his future role in the court. Daehyun rose from his sofa and walked toward him, slow enough for Yongguk to tell him to stop, but Yongguk didn’t.

He stared at the way Daehyun’s chest went up and down, how pink his cheeks were. Then he was sitting on the edge of Yongguk’s cushion, and his nose was close enough to brush against Yongguk’s if he turned his head. He did, and then Daehyun was saying, “I wanted to thank you for earlier,” and pressing his lips against Yongguk’s in a sweet, innocent kiss. A first kiss. The kind that sent a shiver of excitement but also a pulse of confusion all through your body. Yongguk kissed him back in the brief time he was allowed, suddenly hungry for it like a wolf, and when they pulled apart Daehyun’s lips were bright red.

“You’re welcome,” Yongguk blurted, like a fool.

He berated himself mentally but Daehyun seemed to find the sentence endearing, a darker blush spreading over his cheeks as he looked down into his lap. “Um,” the prince said, smiling blindingly and trying to hide it, “that’s all, I guess.”

Before he could process it, Daehyun was skipping away again, and then he was gone. Yongguk touched his fingers to his lips, dazed, wondering what he could do to earn his next kiss.

.


End file.
